Franz Kafka's private papers opened in Swiss bank

One of the 20th century's most abiding literary secrets was prized open in the vaults of a Swiss bank yesterday as scholars got their first glimpse of Franz Kafka's unpublished private papers.

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UBS headquarters at Bahnhofstrasse in ZurichPhoto: EPA

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Franz KafkaPhoto: REX FEATURES

By Adrian Blomfield in Jerusalem

10:54AM BST 20 Jul 2010

For over 50 years a vast treasure trove containing the bulk of the Czech author's writing has been hidden away in 10 safety deposit boxes, tantalising Kafka enthusiasts around the world.

Their hopes of unearthing a major literary find have come closer to fruition after Israel's supreme court ended a two-year legal tussle over the ownership of his estate by ordering that the boxes finally be opened.

The ruling represented a victory for the Israeli state against two septuagenarian sisters, Eva Hoffe and Ruth Wiesler, whose family has jealously guarded their custodianship of the Kafka papers since the 1960s.

In keeping with the drama of a case that has wound its way through the Israeli legal system for two years, Mrs Hoffe has made a last-minute bid to protect the secrecy of the collection.

After flying from Tel Aviv to Zurich, she marched into the headquarters of the UBS bank and demanded that officials prevent the boxes being opened, insisting that they also contained her own, personal belongings.

Her bid failed, and a team of lawyers and manuscript experts began their race to sift through thousands of documents, which are believed to include notes, diaries, drawings and perhaps even an incomplete novel. They have been given two days to finish their work.

What they might find is anyone's guess.

"No one knows what is the number of letters or manuscripts or diaries to be found there," said Dan Novhari, a lawyer representing the court-appointed executor of the Hoffe estate.

"There are rumours that the contents have been checked in the past and that there is a list but we don't have the list and the court doesn't have the list, though maybe the sisters do."

The saga of publishing Kafka's works is a long one, dating back the famously overwrought author's death from tuberculosis in 1924.

Shortly before he died, Kafka entrusted his portfolio to Max Brod, his biographer and mentor, asking him to destroy its contents.

Ignoring his friend's wishes, Brod published some of the novels, such as "The Trial" and "The Castle" that were to propel Kafka into the pantheon of modern literary genius.

But he retained the bulk of the papers, bringing them to Tel Aviv after fleeing the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1938 and then leaving them to his secretary and, so rumour has it, lover Ester Hoffe.

Mrs Hoffe die two years ago, at the age of 101, and left the remains of the collection – some of which she sold – to her two daughters.

But the Hoffe will was immediately challenged by the Israeli National Library, which claimed the collection on behalf of the state on the grounds that it was priceless piece of Jewish heritage. Both Brod and Kafka were Jews.

For Eva Hoffe and her sister, the library's claim is little more than a state-sanctioned invasion of property rights.

According to their lawyer, Oded Hacohen, the ruling of three courts that the papers must be studied independently before a judgement is made on who owns them not only undermines the value of the collection but comes close to expropriation.

"The court failed to respect the sanctity of property rights," he said. "I've been a lawyer for 30 years and it is not many times that I have been ashamed of the Israeli justice system but this is one of those times.

The sisters say they are ultimately planning to sell the collection in its entirety to the German Literary Archive in Marbach, a proposal that has raised hackles in Israel because Brod is viewed as a Holocaust survivor.

Whatever the next twists and turns in the case, it may still be months before the public learns the secrets of the Kafka archive.

Mr HaCohen is seeking an injunction to prevent any details of what is found in the boxes from being published. With the Israelis courts in Summer recess, no decision is expected until September at the earliest, but lawyers involved in the case say they expect the details will remain under wraps until a ruling is made.